Fort Charlotte: A Fragment of Forgotten Frontier History

                                                    By Tonya A. Guy
                                (Extracted from the May/June 2022 Quill)

Before the first arrival of European explorers in 1520, Native Americans had lived for thousands of years in what is now called South Carolina.  There were at least 29 different Native American tribes here, but the most important were the Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Catawba, and Choctaw.  These tribes played a key role in the settlement of the backcountry—both as friend and as foe.  As settlers began to arrive in South Carolina, treaties had to be made between the British government and the Native Americans to obtain land for these new people to live on.  

Also, trade with the Indians became a main source of income for the colonists and the government.  However, the most significant part the Native Americans played was during times of war.  While some Indians, who were on the warpath, killed many white pioneers, other Indians offered protection for them.  These and other reasons are why survival in the backcountry depended heavily on good relations with the Indians.

Indian trade was critically important to the fledgling colony of South Carolina. The European demand for clothing (breeches, gloves, hats, etc.) made from deerskin created a tremendous market. In fact, deerskins were the most valuable commodity exported from Charles Town until rice became the primary crop of the colony in the 1730’s. By mid-century, over 150,000 deerskins per year left South Carolina and the value of deerskins accounted for 20 percent of the colony’s exports. By the 1750’s, almost every Cherokee town had its own resident trader, many of whom were allied by marriage to the families of local headmen. 

For the Cherokee people, ownership of European trade goods conferred social status. Firearms (trade muskets), in particular, cost as much as 35 skins apiece and were highly prized. A Cherokee hunter could use such a weapon to kill approximately thirty deer per season and increase his ability to trade for other items such as jewelry, cloth, paint, and tools. Trade was also seen by the native tribes as a “symbol of ongoing friendship and alliance with others.” Basically, gift giving was a sign of good faith to the Indians.  (“The Present Defenceless State of the Country”: Gunpowder Plots in Revolutionary South Carolina, by Philip G. Swan, The South Carolina Historical Magazine, Vol. 108, No. 4 (Oct., 2007), South Carolina Historical Society, pgs. 297-298.) 

However, in 1715, poor treatment of the Native Americans by English traders resulted in an Indian uprising lead by the Yemassee that became known as the Yemassee War. Approximately 100 settlers were killed, but the Native American loses were far greater.  By the mid-1700’s, virtually all of the smaller Indian tribes throughout South Carolina disappeared, probably merging with larger groups, such as the Catawba and Cherokee of South Carolina or the Creeks of Georgia. 

In 1738, James Glen was appointed Governor of South Carolina and became known for his positive relations with the Native Americans. He served until 1756 and had the longest term of any of South Carolina’s colonial governors. In 1761, he published A Description of South Carolina.  One quote in particular from his book would prove to be quite profound.

"The concerns of this Country are so closely connected and interwoven with Indian affairs, and not only a great branch of our trade, but even the safety of this Province, do so much depend upon our continuing in friendship with 
the Indians, that I thought it highly necessary to gain all the knowledge I could of them . . ." (A Description of South Carolina:  Containing Many Curious and Interesting Particulars relating to the Civil, Natural and Commercial History of that Colony, by Governor James Glen, London:  R. and J. Dodsley, 1761, p. 242.)

In 1746, a group of settlers from Pennsylvania and Virginia requested land around Ninety Six. They understood that the land belonged to the Indians, so they asked the provincial government to purchase it for them.  The following year, Governor Glen met with the Cherokees and bought the land on the left bank of Long Cane Creek.  The colony paid the Cherokees L975 worth of powder and bullets for the land. Then, in 1755, the Cherokees agreed to cede an estimated forty thousand acres to South Carolina, which was supposed to be all their lands in the colony. (Council Journal, PRO Photostats, No. 3, January 14, 1746; Council Journal, No. 16, June 12, 1747, pp. 39-40; and South Carolina Colonial Land Policies, Robert K. Ackerman, Tricentennial Studies, Number 9, 
Columbia:  University of South Carolina Press, 1977, p. 105.)  

However, tension continued to grow between the ever encroaching colonists and the native tribes, particularly with the Cherokee. The French and Indian War (1754–1763) motivated even more people to flood down the Great Wagon Road and into the South Carolina backcountry. Prior to 1759, the Cherokees were allies of the English against the French, but relations rapidly deteriorated as isolated incidents of violence occurred between the Cherokees and European settlers. The incident that led to the Cherokee War (1759-1761) actually began in late 1758, in Virginia, when settlers attacked and killed several Cherokee warriors, without provocation, who were returning from fighting against the French.  In early 1759, the Cherokees retaliated by attacking settlers in North Carolina, and from there, the conflict began to spread further south.

At this time, there were two forts in the area, Fort Moore and Fort Prince George, that were garrisoned to protect the “Ninety Six District” area from Indian attack. (Ninety Six District is put into quotes, because it was not officially recognized as Ninety Six District until 1769.) Fort Moore was built in 1716 as a result of the Yamasee War.  It was located in the area now known as Beech Island, (now Aiken County, SC) on the Savannah River. It was considered to be “the most important of South Carolina’s early forts,” and was built to protect the backcountry “from future attack and to guard the vital trading routes to the major Southern Indians.” (South Carolina Highway Historical Marker Guide, by South Carolina Department of Archives and History (SCDAH), Columbia, SC: SCDAH, 1992, page 6.)  Fort Prince George was built in 1753, under the direction of Governor Glenn, on the Keowee River in what is now Pickens County, South Carolina. Nearby was the Cherokee town of Keowee and other Cherokee towns lay within fifteen miles of the fort. (A Memoir of the Archaeological Excavation of Fort Prince George, Pickens County, South Carolina Along with Pertinent Historical Documentation, by Marshall W. Williams, Columbia, SC: South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of South Carolina, 1998, page 3.) Both of these forts were abandoned in the mid-1760’s.

As the Cherokee went on the warpath in the backcountry, a delegation of Cherokee town leaders arrived in Charleston seeking peace. They included fifty-five men and women, with a number of headmen. The leader, Oconostota, spoke before Governor William Lyttelton and the Council. He apologized for the raids on the settlers and stated that he was “endeavoring to clear all that is bad.” After hearing them speak, Lyttelton took the delegation” under protective care” and carried twenty-two of the headmen along with a military force of about 1,300 men to Fort Prince George. (The Dividing Paths: Cherokees and South Carolinians Through the Era of Revolution, by Tom Hatley, New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1995, pages 114-115) As the troops neared the Cherokee villages in the upper portion of South Carolina, the headmen were taken hostage, which was a high insult to the Cherokee. However, it was smallpox, not Indians, that ravaged the colonial army. In fact, the disease swept through the men so quickly that Lyttleton hurriedly negotiated a treaty, which was signed on 22 December 1759, and headed back to Charleston. Nevertheless, the treaty did not bring peace and Lyttleton continued to hold the headmen hostage at Fort Prince George until twenty-four “Cherokee murderers” surrendered.

In response, bands of Cherokees went on the warpath. They conducted a number of bloody raids, which caused many of the settlers to flee to the security of forts in the area. The most famous of these attacks occurred on 1 February 1760. A wagon train of mainly Scots-Irish refugees were on their way to Fort Moore for safety, but were fell upon by a group of Native warriors near Long Cane Creek.  Now called the “Long Cane Massacre,” twenty-three people were slain and buried on site, including the grandmother of John C. Calhoun.  The day after the assault occurred, Patrick Calhoun, gave a deposition about it that was later published in newspapers in the colonies and England. It appears below:

"PERSONALLY appeared before us Lauchlan McGillivray, and Edward Bernard, Esquires, two of His Majesty’s Justices of the Peace for the District aforesaid, Patrick Calhoun, who being duly sworn, saith, “That on Friday, the 1st of this Inst. about Ten o’Clock, in the Forenoon, as this Deponent was coming off from the Long-Cane Settlement in South Carolina, about 50 Miles above Augusta, with all the Inhabitants of that Settlement, being about 40 fighting Men in Number, they were then attacked by a Body of about 100 Cherokee Indians, and after about Half an Hour’s Engagement he, this Deponent, with what were left alive, came off, and that he believes there are about 40 Men, Women and Children killed and taken, with 7 Waggons. This Deponent further saith, that the Indians attacked them on Horseback, just as they had got some of their Waggons out of the Bog, whereby they were not in a Condition to receive them, having the most of their Guns in their Waggons, and had not Time to recover them till put into Confusion, and some did not get their Guns at all.
PATRICK CALHOUN.” Sworn this 2d Day of February, etc. (The Pennsylvania Gazette, 28 February 1760. Also in The Derby Mercury, Derby, Derbyshire, England, 28 March 1760.)

Patrick and William Calhoun, along with several others, are believed to have built the first Scotch-Irish cabins ever erected in this section of what would later become Old Abbeville District (now McCormick County). ((A History of the Upper Country of South Carolina, from the Earliest Periods to the Close of the War of Independence, Volume I, John H. Logan, Original publisher—Columbia:  S. G. Courtenay & Co., 1859, Reprinted—Spartanburg:  The Reprint Company, 1960, page 9.) They, like so many other families, had come to settle in this place to seek a new life away from war, but now found themselves right in the midst of conflict. More reports continued to be printed in the newspaper about this and other incidents:

"From Fort Moore we learn, that a Gang of about 18 Cherokees, divided into 3 or 4 Parties, on the 15th Instant, way-laid, killed and scalped Ulric Tobler, Esq; a Captain of Militia in those Parts, as he was riding from his Father’s to that Fort; and shot Mr. William Calhoon, who was with him, in the Hand; three other Persons who were in Company, escaped unhurt; the Indian who killed Capt. Tobler, left a Hatchet sticking in his Neck, on which were 3 old Notches, and 3 newly cut. Some Negroes belonging to Lachlan McGillivray, Esq; employed on this Side Savannah River, were likewise beset by the Indians, but being timely succoured, beat off the Enemy. About the same time, two Men were killed and scalped near Mr. James Germany’s Fort, where most of the Broad-River People are. . . 

. . . Mr. Patrick Calhoon, one of the unfortunate Settlers at Long Canes, who 
were attacked by the Cherokees on the 1st Instant, as they were removing their Wives, Children and best Effects to Augusta, in Georgia, for Safety, is just come to Town, and informs us, that the Whole of those Settlers might be about 250 Souls, 55 or 60 of them fighting Men; that their Loss in that Affair amounted to about 50 Persons, chiefly Women and Children, with 13 loaded Waggons and Carts; that he had since been at the Place where the Action happened, in order to bury the Dead, and found only twenty of their Bodies, most inhumanly butchered; that the Indians had burnt the Woods all round, but had left the Waggons and Carts there empty and unhurt; and that he believes all the fighting Men would return to and fortify the Long-Cane Settlement, were Part of the Rangers so stationed as to give them some Assistance and Protection. (The Pennsylvania Gazette, 20 March 1760)

Shortly after the Long Cane Massacre, one of the Cherokee headmen, Oconostota, who had signed the Lyttelton treaty and was a former prisoner at Fort Prince George, set an ambush for Lieutenant Richard Cotymore, commander of the fort. Cotymore was lured from the fort and attacked by the Cherokees. He was killed and the garrison executed the remaining hostages in revenge. In response, Governor Lyttelton requested British troops to assist in the war effort and then returned to England, leaving the colony in the hands of Lieutenant Governor William Bull, Jr.  Meanwhile, settlers continued to abandon their homes and farms, and poured into the forts in and around Ninety-Six and Augusta, Georgia. The forts were crammed with people and disease, especially smallpox, made living conditions even more deplorable.  

In desperation, Governor Bull sent approximately 400 South Carolina Rangers along with Colonel Archibald Montgomery and his 1,200 Highlanders into the Carolina upcountry, in April and May 1760, to defeat the Cherokees. Montgomery’s troops burned several Cherokee villages and relieved the garrison at Fort Prince George, then he returned to Charleston convinced that the conflict was over. However, the tribes continued their warfare and laid siege to Fort Loudoun (in present-day Tennessee). On 8 August 1760, the Cherokees, led by Oconostota, lured the troops outside the fort and then attacked them, killing the commander and twenty-three others (the number of Native American hostages killed at Fort Prince George), and they took many captives. Governor Bull negotiated to ransom the hostage soldiers and prepared another expedition. (The Dividing Paths: Cherokees and South Carolinians Through the Era of Revolution, by Tom Hatley, New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1995, pages 127-135)

In May and June 1761, Colonel James Grant led more than 2,400 troops to subdue the Cherokee nation. His soldiers defeated Cherokee warriors in battle and burned towns and thousands of acres of crops.  This “total-war” approach broke the Cherokees’ will to wage war. By July, they were defeated and negotiated a peace treaty, which was signed on 23 September 1761. By this agreement, a pro-English headman, Little Carpenter, was named emperor of the Cherokees, and all Frenchmen in Cherokee territory were to be expelled. Furthermore, a dividing line was established that separated the Cherokees from South Carolina lands. In the division, the Cherokee lost much of their hunting lands to Carolina settlers. (The Dividing Paths: Cherokees and South Carolinians Through the Era of Revolution, by Tom Hatley, New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1995, pages 138-140)

Each side, the colonists and the Cherokees, had suffered tremendous losses. Countless people had died from war and disease, and both experienced economic hardships from the cost of war. Though peace was secured on the surface, terror in the backcountry continued for a number of years. Other Native tribes remained a constant threat and the addition of marauders and highwaymen only added to the trepidation. This led to the rise of the Regulators, a vigilantly group formed to bring law and order to the frontier, but even they eventually became part of the problem. Thus, the building of more forts in the area was presented as a solution to the chaos and construction on Fort Charlotte began in the summer of 1765.           
To Be Continued . . .